Is your child starting Kindergarten in the Fall? Are your toddlers ready to become students? Please join us for an open house to learn about Kindergarten and Pre-K at Whitman school on Wednesday, March 12 5:30-6:30. A second session for Kinder families will be held March 20 8:00-9:00.

Families and guardians,

Please include the office in any and all communication regarding your student being absent. Teachers don't always have time to keep the office updated and can only mark students as absent or tardy in their system. Only the office can excuse an absence.

Please email Joanna (jgoebel@pps.net) or call 503-916-6370 to speak with the office or leave a message. In all cases, please be sure to leave a reason (illness, appointment, emergency, etc.) for your students' absence. We must call any unexcused absent students each day. 

If you have questions please feel free to contact us! 

Show your wildcat pride with our student-designed apparel!

¡Muestre su orgullo de "wildcat" con nuestra ropa diseñada por estudiantes!

Thể hiện niềm tự hào "wildcat" của bạn với áo phông do học sinh thiết kế!

Students voted on contest submissions to decide our new logo! Congratulations to Stella in 4th grade on your winning design! All wildcats ARE paw-some! 

¡Los estudiantes votaron las entradas para decidir sobre nuestro nuevo logo! ¡Felicitaciones a Stella de cuarto grado por su diseño ganador!

Các sinh viên đã bỏ phiếu cho các mục để quyết định logo mới của chúng tôi! Xin chúc mừng Stella lớp 4 về thiết kế chiến thắng của bạn!

Click here to visit our store! ¡Haz clic aquí para visitar nuestra tienda! Bấm vào đây để tham quan cửa hàng cửa chúng tôi!

Or visit https://www.bonfire.com/wildcat-gear/ 

HeART of Portland, the annual celebration of local student artists, is returning to the Portland Art Museum (PAM) beginning April 16.

The two-week fine arts showcase features work by students from across Portland Public Schools and is made possible by the Arts Access Fund, which also supports elementary visual and performing arts educators.

2025 HeART of Portland kicks off with an opening reception at PAM on April 16 at 6:30 p.m. and concludes with the Miller Family Free Day on April 27. The opening reception will include musical and theatrical performances, as well as a set from the elementary school honor choir – made up of two singers from each PPS elementary – and the debut of the honor dance collective. 

In addition, the showcase will feature more than 100 works of student visual art, handpicked by PPS arts educators, and a collaborative art project for K-12 students that embraces the rebellious spirit of the current PAM exhibition, Psychedelic Rock Posters and Fashion of the 1960s. 

The reception and HeART of Portland exhibits are free and open to everyone. Please join us in lifting up our student artists!

Portland Public Schools is continuing to host a series of events aimed at starting productive conversations about what is possible in the systems we create for our children with disabilities.

As part of this series, we are excited to welcome you to a free screening of The Ride Ahead on Thursday March 20 at McMenamins Kennedy School. Doors open at 6 p.m. and the movie begins at 7:00.

The Ride Ahead is a film about adult life with disabilities by a man with disabilities. It is the debut of 21-year-old Samuel Habib who, struggling to find his place in the world, decides to make a film that charts how a group of disabled adults navigate challenges and forge their own unique paths. The film serves as a roadmap for himself and others and illustrates the compelling power of one person truly determined to live life on his own terms.

In documenting his journey, Samuel is following in the footsteps of his father, the filmmaker Dan Habib. You can learn more about their work here.

Staff, families, and community members are all invited. Parking is free and McMenamins' full menu is available for ordering. We hope to see you there!

In meteorological terms, Portland’s first big weather event of 2024 was the definition of a perfect storm. Frigid temperatures and high winds combined with snow and ice to bring down tree limbs, close roads, scramble traffic, freeze pipes, and knock out power for tens of thousands of residents.

It was a metaphorical perfect storm for Portland Public Schools as well. Fallen trees cut power to multiple schools and others have suffered water damage from broken pipes. Lack of heat was also a problem, and impassable roads, paired with snowed-in and icy parking lots, made it impossible for buses to run safely. Those same conditions limited how the district’s facilities and operations teams can even assess the scope of the issues, let alone begin working on solutions. And icy sidewalks meant walkers have no safe route to school.

This week could bring similar conditions to the Portland area, and PPS’s School Closure Team is ready to meet the challenge. The team convenes regularly during inclement weather to take all of the above into careful consideration. By now, families are quite familiar with how the district communicates these decisions. What’s perhaps less known is how district leaders arrive at such decisions in the first place. 

As part of our district's focus on events that center belonging, equity, and inclusion, we have been screening a series of films that we hope will challenge our perceptions about what is possible in the systems we create for our children with disabilities.

The next film in the series is “Champions,” which will screen on Saturday February 8th at 2:00 PM at Lincoln High School. This event will also include first-hand testimonials from PPS students.

This movie highlights the journey of a basketball coach who leads a team of players with intellectual disabilities. Through humor and heartfelt moments, the movie emphasizes the strengths, individuality, and value each player brings to the team and how inclusion enriches communities and creates positive, supportive environments.

Staff, families, and community members are all invited. Parking is free and light refreshment will be provided. We hope to see you there!